8 



THE IRRIGATION AGE. 



Ireland, or Scotland, or the Netherlands, or Greece. 

 And the forty-four States and three Territories com- 

 bined present the grandest field for the triumphs of 

 civilization on the globe. The new year would cer- 

 tainly be surprised to learn that a nation with such 

 assets at its back could be in a state of financial, in- 

 dustrial, social and political embarrassment. 



SOME VERY STRIKING ANOMALIES. 



But after 1895 had comprehended the territorial 

 grandeur of the United States, he would be struck 

 dumb again by certain very curious anomalies which 

 would stand out with startling distinctness to his un- 

 prejudiced vision. He would observe that almost 

 everybody lives in the eastern half of the continent. 

 If he consulted the census he would find to his 

 amazement that more than ninety per cent, of the 

 American people live east of the Missouri river. He 

 would find not only that the swarming millions are in 

 the East, but that here also is a vast amount of idle 

 capital and a growing and threatening amount of idle 

 labor. He would not have to be told that idle capital 

 and idle labor are useless. Nor would he need to be 

 gifted with extraordinary intelligence to understand 

 that whatever is idle, and therefore useless, is also 

 dangerous. 



Now, it would not be at all difficult for this new- 

 comer to discover why capital and labor are loafers, 

 and almost beggars, in America at this time. Re- 

 member, 1895 is no statesman, like Secretary Morton, 

 and no eminent statistician, like Mr. Edward Atkin- 

 son of Boston. So it would not occur to him to join 

 the former in declaring that the country is in trouble 

 because it is "overproducing" the necessities of life, 

 nor to follow the latter in formulating remedies in 

 the shape of pamphlets designed to show these over- 

 fed Americans how they can exist on soup bones for 

 a few cents a day. You see, 1895 is not trying to use 

 his brains, but only his eyes. And he will instantly 

 observe that the reason capital and labor are not en- 

 gaged in developing new resources in the eastern 

 part of the United States is that there are practically 

 no new resources to develop. And this would lead our 

 unprejudiced observer from the upper skies to turn 

 his gaze toward the other half of the continent. 

 There he would see a domain of equal dimensions 

 with a population amounting to only about seven per 

 cent, of the country's total. He would observe that 

 here is as much hunger for capital as there is a sur- 

 feit of it in the East. But the most astounding thing 

 that he would realize would be -the fact that in west- 

 ern America the good God made resources many 

 times as varied and extensive as those in Eastern 

 America. These startling anomalies would tell 

 young 1895 the reason for national distress and stag- 

 nation in much less time than it has taken to write 

 these words. And if the whole American people 



could be gathered into a gigantic balloon, lifted miles 

 above the mists of all provincial and political preju- 

 dice, and permitted to take a bird's eye view of their 

 country for a few minutes, they would see it all with 

 equal clearness. 



THE LESSON OF THE WORLD'S FAIR. 



In 1893 the American people expended millions of 

 dollars and unmeasured oceans of patriotic oratory 

 in celebrating. Celebrating what? The triumph of 

 a political system? The triumph of protection over 

 free trade? The triumph of bimetalism over the 

 single standard, or the triumph of the single 

 standard over bimetalism? Not at all. These were 

 but incidents in the fabric of national achievement. 

 The World's Exposition celebrated the conquest of 

 human genius over the continent discovered by 

 Columbus. In this conquest industry and art, labor 

 and capital, intellect and simple brawn, all had their 

 honorable parts. But the great material fact was 

 this: That a continent had been reclaimed from 

 savagery. Forest and prairie, lake and river, moun- 

 tain and valley, had been turned to the manifold 

 uses of humanity. All that the World's Fair repre- 

 sented was the product of labor applied to a conti- 

 nental item of raw material. In the process of con- 

 verting it into the manufactured article which we 

 call civilization, a vast prosperity was yielded up and 

 distributed through all ranks of society. It was the 

 triumph of this process that the World's Fair cele- 

 brated with loud acclaim. 



ON WITH NATIONAL DESTINY! 



National life resembles water. When it stands 

 stagnant it gives forth a stench that breeds disease. 

 It is only pure and sweet and health-giving when it 

 flows swiftly. And it is still pure if in the course of 

 its rapid flow it encounters rocks and sandbars. Diffi- 

 culties and dangers are not necessarily evils, but 

 motion and progress these are indispensable. Pros- 

 perity will come back to the American people when 

 they return to the policy that made them great. We 

 are to-day in the process of readjustment. Industry 

 and society will be reorganized to some extent. Cer- 

 tain tendencies of our later development have gone 

 too far and must be arrested. But these things will 

 work themselves out all in good time. The thing of 

 vital importance is that the nation should go forward 

 in its destiny. The armies of civilization must not 

 halt at the one hundredth meridian, the boundary of 

 Arid America. They must go forward to new and 

 grander conquests. They must make homes for new 

 millions, erected upon new foundations, suited to the 

 needs of a new century. So long as one-half of this 

 continent remains to be conquered there should not be 

 an idle or hornet/ess man in America or in Europe, 

 nor a surplus and useless dollar. 



